Episode 1
The opening episode introduces The Unpopular View: challenging the narratives dividing Boomers, Gen Z, and the Global South. Michael Brown frames the show's focus on foreign aid, development, climate, governance, and the global realities public debate often ignores.
Koffi Kouakou and Michael Brown discuss Africa's youth surge, technology, and the competing paths toward transformation or instability.
Michael Brown concludes a three-part North-South dialogue with longtime colleague Koffi Kouakou on African realities, American assumptions, and the China factor. They examine Africa's youth surge, technology adoption, political risk, and the race between transformation and instability.
Read episode pageSource episodeA North-South dialogue on Africa's future, outside assumptions, China, and the limits of single-story narratives.
Michael Brown sits down with longtime colleague Koffi Kouakou for a North-South dialogue on African realities, American assumptions, and the China factor. They challenge single-story narratives about Africa and look at what outside observers routinely miss.
Read episode pageSource episodeLocalization only matters if it changes who holds power, resources, and the ability to make outside aid unnecessary.
Every development program claims its goal is to leave. None of them do. The Green Revolution helped India move from famine risk to food exporter status and then ended because it succeeded. Much of today's aid system has not followed that logic. This episode argues that the only development model worth funding is one designed to make itself unnecessary by shifting authority, capacity, and long-term control to communities.
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